HIV-Positive Haitians Struggle for Survival One Year After the Earthquake

By the beginning of 2010, Haiti had made significant progress toward lowering its once-astronomical HIV rate. In 1993, 9.4 percent of the impoverished nation was infected with HIV, a number that represented almost half the people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) in the entire Caribbean. By 2008 the adult HIV prevalence in Haiti had fallen to 2.2 percent -- approximately 120,000 people, 53 percent of whom were women -- reports (pdf) the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

Then came the catastrophic 7.0 earthquake of Jan. 12, 2010, which flattened much of Port-au-Prince. Many hospitals and HIV/AIDS clinics were crippled, if not destroyed, and the health-care system that had proudly enabled the Caribbean nation to control its HIV/AIDS epidemic collapsed.

Relief and international funding did not arrive quickly enough. Less than 40 percent of the 24,000 people prescribed antiretroviral medications (ARVs) had access to them. Up to a million people were displaced and began living in camps, which, with their poor sanitary conditions, soon became virtual petri dishes of disease.

"It looks the same as the very day of the quake," reports Haitian American Nadine Juste-Beckles, executive director of adult day services for Housing Works, the New York City-based non-profit that finds homes for PLWHA. Juste-Beckles has returned to the island three times since the disaster.

But even one year after the tragedy, she says, the situation remains grim: "It is unimaginable that Haiti continues to face devastation, tragedy and ongoing suffering."

Rebuilding Haiti's AIDS Infrastructure

"At least half of Port-au-Prince's AIDS clinics appear to have been destroyed," Housing Works' CEO, Charles King, reported after the earthquake. King and Housing Works were among the first responders to arrive in Haiti and deliver ARVs.

The first and smaller clinic, in Port-au-Prince, is run by the PHAP+, a coalition of 12 grassroots Haitian AIDS organizations treating up to 20 people per day. The second is the Fondation Esther Boucicault Stanislas (FEBS), founded by the first Haitian to publicly disclose her HIV-positive status.

Located north of Port-au-Prince in St. Marc, outside the disaster zone, FEBS treats up to 75 people daily but cannot keep up with the demand, Boucicault says. Many HIV-positive Haitians have fled there.

The cholera outbreak that was once limited to Port-au-Prince now threatens St. Marc and FEBS, relief workers say. "The situation has [become] out of control," Juste-Beckles reports.

Few Options for Gay HIV-Positive Men

SEROvie, Haiti's largest organization serving gay and transgender people with HIV, was devastated by the quake. Its building was flattened, and the majority of the staff were killed.

"There has been very little progress since then," says Valentin, a 29-year-old HIV-positive Haitian American volunteer who just returned from a relief mission and prefers that his last name not be used. "SEROvie is borrowing space for support meetings and to dispense medicines to clients. But there is so much need, and few funds. And of course stigma is now even more of a problem."

SEROvie is rebuilding its presence on Facebook and trying to connect with gay and bisexual men via cell phones so that the lucky few can receive occasional text messages about medications and other services. "But that is a luxury," Valentin notes. "Most people who are poz are in the camps and have few options."

Tent Camps Fueling New Infections?

Sex in these camps is a reality, and rape, prostitution and promiscuity will almost certainly increase HIV's spread. "I think we could well have 200,000 to 300,000 affected by HIV," says Boucicault. "Because what can you do in a tent? Nothing. Nothing, no entertainment, nothing. The only thing you can do is sex. So you have sex."

Rape was a serious problem in Haiti before the quake, but the situation for women has gotten even worse, human-rights groups say. Rapes have tripled in Port-au-Prince, according to the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, which has been monitoring HIV/AIDS in post-earthquake Haiti.

And rape spreads HIV and brings about more HIV-positive, expectant mothers, Boucicault adds.

UNAIDS has established mobile HIV-testing locations, plus 68 sites to provide ARVs and 117 to prevent mother-to-child HIV transmission. Still, doctors doing HIV testing at just one tent-camp clinic "are seeing at least 15 to 20 new cases each day," notes Beatrice Dalencourt Turnier, a social mobilization officer for UNAIDS.

"Enough is enough," says Juste-Beckles. "And as a Haitian American, I have to ask, when is the suffering going to stop? When will the global community come together and address this emergent situation so the country can move forward?''

Rod McCullom, a writer and television news producer, blogs on Black gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender news and pop culture at rod20.com.

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